Boob Jam, a developer game jam inspired by journalist Jenn Frank, hopes to create games that take the focus away from breasts as sexual objects, and put it on the challenges (and importance) of women having them.

From Frank's tweet people began talking about breasts beyond jiggle physics and as sexual objects. This led to a novel idea: why not create a game jam that can explore breasts in a non-sexual way?

Here is how the Tumblr for The Boob Jam explains the whole point of this exercise:

Game critics, players, and big-budget developers sure seem to love talking about boobs. It never ends! Are they too big, are they too small, are they not covered-up enough, are the boobs believable for the character…? Oh, and jiggle physics! Jiggle physics are a big deal!

For the rest of us, though, boobs aren’t necessarily playthings for other people. They’re just something we have. We live with “jiggle physics" every day. Sometimes boobs get in the way. Sometimes we have to cut them off. Sometimes it makes walking up the street a chore (since, after all, boobs can be the most salient sex or gender marker). Some of us wish we had boobs; some of us curse the day they arrived. Boobs are actually… kinda complicated!

The page goes on to explain how developers could use this opportunity to explain the challenges of having big or small breasts, the importance of breasts to a new mother or someone becoming a woman, the reality of breast size to a super hero or a warrior, how breasts are sexualized by people who aren't men, the fear of illness such as breast cancer, or the importance of promoting breast health.

You can learn more about the game jam here. The Boob Jam will run until the end of September.

Honestly, bra shopping IRL is such a pain in the ass, I think I'd sob if I had to do it in a video game. Although I guess it could work as some kind of puzzle game, I mean, jesus, trying to find a bra that fits well is one thing, especially if you're tiny or huge since a lot of everyday stores just don't even bother catering for you. Trying to find one that goes with an outfit is a whole other beast. The straps have to be narrow enough, or removable, the colour right, do you go balcony or plunge style, AGH. I'm having holiday shopping flashbacks just thinking about it. If somebody could make that experience fun, I'd be impressed!

I could kinda see it though. It could be a good opportunity to explore diversity of boobage, too.

Lots of areas of the body are erogenous zones. Feet. Ears. Eyelids, even. These things can be sexy during sexy times, but they are not sexy tools all of the time. They are actual functioning body parts with a purpose to serve beyond giving oglers a cheap thrill.

Yes of course, and we pee from our wee-wee's too. Duh. Breasts are not only sexual of course, but they are sexual specifically (they play several roles in the procreative cycle). While the other body parts you mention are not necessarily. You may love getting your eyelid stroked until your pants explode but you still know it's not a direct sexual part whose purpose is to facilitate sexual arousal or to facilitate some part of procreation.

Unlike a fetish though, breasts directly, physiologically and consistently arouse women when handled by their lovers and turn men on for the instinctive showing that the female has reached the age of fertility and the pleasure it brings to women to be caressed there. The other areas such as those you mention require a more personal psychological fixation like the foot fetish etc.

Breasts aren't actually required for any part of sex any more than male breasts are. Breastfeeding is a maternal function, not a sexual function.

You seem to be arguing that the primary function of boobs is to be sexual. It isn't. I hate to break it to you, but they're just sacks of fat that hang off a lady's chest and perform a role in childrearing. That they happen to be erogenous zones, which just means lots of nerve endings and sensitivity that can lead to arousal, doesn't mean boobs need to be portrayed as sex objects all the time, or that to make a woman sexy you need to give her a big wobbly rack.

There's no shame in enjoying a bit of boobage, and certainly they can provide plenty of entertainment for owner and partner. but at least respect that they are there for more than sexual satisfaction, so a project like this which explores the fact that they are more than mere sex toys is hardly a bad thing.

Oh please, first you try to elevate elbows and eyelids to common sexual hotspots and now you belittle breasts as unnecessary and bags of fat (forget the actual developed mammary glands I suppose)?

I guess by your reckoning the clitoris isn’t sexual either, after all it’s simply bump of flesh which just “happen to be erogenous zones, which just means lots of nerve endings and sensitivity that can lead to arousal” and is not necessary to have sex considering how many women have become pregnant without clitoral stimulation or even coming to orgasm.

Look, I get that you're pissed I said the game is a waste of time IMO, but seriously to make your argument you have to say that the human body isn’t what everyone knows it is and has been forever. If you have to do this then you are unreasonable and simply can’t be reasoned with. And since you can’t be reasoned with it would be foolish to continue to try. I'm done trying to talk to people in backwards world where up is down, left is right, night is day, and breasts are not sexual.

That's not the point. No one's saying breasts have no sexual connotation or function, simply that they're not exclusively sexual even though that's how games tend to treat them. This is simply an exercise in expanding the horizons of game design. Kind of like a challenge from a while back that tasked filmmakers to make a "don't talk during the movie" short without employing violence. No one's suggesting that the use of violence was bad or wrong, just that it's not the only means of communicating the same idea.

Personally, I'm interested to see if anyone comes up with something that's fun to play.

Fair enough, but I do feel like there is the creeping insinuation that sexualized imagery of breasts is "bad or wrong" (for example this article posted under the topic "sexism"). Like I should be ashamed that as a man breasts are exciting. Look at the flack Dragon's Crown gets.